


We'll be good in another life

by marinalj



Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst with a Happy Ending, Fix-It, Idiots in Love, M/M, Multiverse, POV Alternating, Post-Avengers: Endgame (Movie), Post-Canon Fix-It, Time Travel
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-08-03
Updated: 2019-08-10
Packaged: 2020-07-30 14:21:32
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,320
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20098600
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/marinalj/pseuds/marinalj
Summary: Everything's ready for the mission. All Steve has to do is return the Infinity Stones to their respective locations across time, but he has his own plans that don't follow the program. He intends to stay in the past. Bucky already suspects Steve probably won't come back, but he doesn't dare say anything to him. What if, when the time comes, nothing goes as they thought it would?It follows the plot of the film with a little twist at the end.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> After watching Endgame, I came up with this idea to fix the ending without completely disregarding the events of the movie and I liked it too much not to give it a try, so here we are. 
> 
> I wrote the whole thing in Spanish and now I'm trying to translate it. I'm sorry in advance if it sounds weird or something. Thank you so much to [yunhaiiro](https://archiveofourown.org/users/yunhaiiro/pseuds/yunhaiiro) because I could never have made it without you.
> 
> The title is from Another place by Bastille because I'm completely obsessed with that song.

As soon as Steve sets both feet on the platform, the machine starts whirring. Not far from him, Sam shifts his weight from one foot to the other nervously while Bruce presses buttons with his chubby, green fingers. Bucky has to turn his back on them because he’s not sure he can bear what he knows is coming. 

The mission was meticulously planned. Steve was supposed to travel to the past and return each and every Infinity Stone to the exact same point they were taken from. For him, an indeterminate amount of time would pass, enough to complete the task. For the rest of them, it should only take a few seconds filled with tension. When those are over, if everything goes according to plan, they could close another chapter of their agitated lives. But Bucky knows that’s not what’s about to happen.

They haven’t talked about it before; they didn’t need to. Bucky knows Steve like the back of his hand, and he knows he’s not coming back to them. Now that time travel is a reality for him, it is obvious that Steve is going to take advantage of the opportunity and go back to the love of his life, Agent Carter.

If they had talked about it, Bucky would have liked to confront him about this. He would have wanted to be more selfish and ask Steve to not leave him alone in a future he didn’t ask to be brought to and where he would never feel comfortable without him, but he can’t do that to his self-sacrificing friend. He doesn’t want to put him in the position of having to choose between living a quiet and happy life with the woman of his dreams or staying with him in a time and a place where he would never be able to find peace. If he had asked, the idiot would have sacrificed his plans for Bucky and he could never forgive himself for that. 

Despite not wanting to ask him to stay, Bucky can’t help but feel a mix of pain and rage, but not against his friend: he could never blame him. Knowing that Steve is happy is the only thing he's ever really wanted in his life and he's willing to do anything to make it happen, even if he has to give up his company. His anger is against a destiny that seems determined to separate them each time they meet again. 

Another reason not to mention to Steve that he knows about his plans is to avoid the moment of saying goodbye. The amount of times they had bid farewell to one another is too small for two people who have spent their lives parting and meeting again. Somehow, they never had time. One of the few times they were able to do so was when Bucky left for Europe, to the war, which now seems to have happened in another life.

“Don’t do anything stupid until I get back”, Bucky had said back then, while they melted into a hug like they would never see each other again.

The exact same sentence the Captain had said minutes before, in what will probably be the last time they see each other. Curious choice of words, since both of them know that doing stupid shit is the only thing they’re good at if the other one is not there to stop them.

That first time they said it, it was Bucky who was heading to a certain death leaving his friend behind. Now the roles have reversed, and it is Steve the one who’s leaving, but this time it is to try and live a happy life, the one he always deserved and Bucky does not dare deny him.

1, 2, 3, 4, 5, …

Bucky’s fists are clenched inside his pockets and he closes his eyes trying to hold back tears. When the longest ten seconds of his life are over, he will have to explain to his two friends why their Captain hasn’t come back or pretend he doesn’t know what’s happening. Whichever option he chooses, he doesn’t think he’ll be able to do it without crumbling.

5, 4, 3, 2, 1, …

The moment is tense at the parcel of forest where they’re at, only the chirping of birds and the buzzing of the machine breaking the silence. The latter suddenly stops.

“Bruce, what’s happening? Why isn’t he back yet?” Sam shouts nervously.

The scientist keeps plucking levers at his dashboard, but nothing changes. When Bucky turns around, he sees Sam running towards the platform in a desperate attempt to find out what's going on, when suddenly it begins vibrating with force. A cloud of white smoke emerges from the center of the base and they hear a dull blow. 

When the smoke finally clears, they see Steve huddled over what appears to be his shield, the same one that had been shattered in the battle against Thanos and is now back in one piece.

They can see even more changes in Steve himself. While the one who had climbed onto the machine just moments before wore a red and white suit, the one they’re seeing now is completely dressed in black and sports a crowded beard.

“Where are we? It didn’t work?” Steve asks while they help him stand up.

At that moment, Sam turns around to face Bucky looking for an explanation he can’t give. When Steve’s gaze follow Sam’s movements and he sees him, his expression changes completely. He approaches him quickly with his eyes wide-open, extending his hands like he was about to touch him, but without daring to do so, as if he was afraid that he would disappear if they made contact.

After a few tense moments in which none of the four dares to speak, it is Steve who finally breaks the silence. 

“Bucky? You’re… alive?”


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> From this chapter onwards, there will be one chapter told from the present (Endgame's present, 2023) and one from the past (where Endgame!Steve went). Thank you for reading!

With a soft touch of his fingers, Steve deactivates the device he’s wearing on his wrist, the one connecting him with the machine that brought him here, to the last stop of his trip across time. A journey that has taken him in the last few days through places as different as Asgard or even Vormir (where he unsuccessfully tried to bring Natasha back to life) to end back on Earth again. At the moment he feels physically and emotionally exhausted and all he wants to do is sleep for a week.

If he said he had meticulously planned what to do next, he’d be lying. For him time travel had only become a real option a few weeks before, when his only concern was bringing back all the people Thanos had wiped off the face of the Earth five years earlier. It wasn’t until Bruce explained that he would have to return the Stones to their respective timelines that the idea crossed his mind and he couldn't stop thinking about it.

What would happen if he went back to her? To Peggy. They had never really dated as such, they had met in the middle of a war and the circumstances were not the most suitable for romance, but Steve had fallen in love at first sight, not only with her beauty (which was not comparable with that of any other girl he had ever met in his life), he had fallen in love with her bravery and her values. Moreover, Peggy had been one of the few people who had been able to see his worth before the serum and she had bothered to meet the real Steve Rogers hiding under Captain America's "disguise", for which he would always be grateful. 

The only person besides Peggy who had known how to love and value the Steve before Erskine was obviously Bucky. A pang of sadness seizes him when he remembers his friend. He should have talked to him before he left and told him about his plans, but the fear that Bucky would ask him to stay kept him from doing so, and now he regrets not having said goodbye like his best friend deserved. They probably won’t see each other again and that pains him, but at least he knows Sam will be by Bucky’s side (or so he hopes) and he will help him find peace after almost a century of fighting battles he wasn’t supposed to fight.

Thinking about Bucky always manages to distract him from what he has to do, so he tries to stop this train of thought and get moving. He hasn’t had much time to plan in detail what to do next and he didn’t know when and where he would ‘land’, so he will have no other choice but to improvise.

The first thing he has to do is making sure he’s physically at the place he wanted to be. The room around him has no windows, the only light coming from a small emergency light bulb placed above the door. Everything points to this place being some kind of laboratory. Furthermore, based on the number of weapons scattered throughout the room, it seems to be located inside a military facility. This should be Camp Lehigh in New Jersey.

On top of one of the tables there are some books and a few papers. The dim light in the room makes it difficult for him to read what they are about but, thanks to his improved senses, he manages to see a date printed on one of the documents.

June 1950. 

Now at least he knows at what point in time he is. Careful not to knock anything down, Steve turns around to get out of the room and explore the place. Before he manages to take a step, he starts hearing a metallic noise on the other side of the door. It starts softly but the blows grow in intensity. It sounds as if someone was hitting a steel plate with a hammer.

Steve doesn’t have enough time to hide before the door falls to the ground and he finds himself standing face to face with Bucky. No, that's not his childhood friend. The person who is now in the room with him is the dehumanized soldier Hydra turned him into and the noise he heard was his metal arm trying to knock down the door.

This was another of the gaps in his plan. At no time it occurred to him that he was travelling to a past where Hydra was infiltrated into SHIELD and they still had the Winter Soldier spreading terror around the world.

The Soldier has a weapon strapped to his back; it seems that he wasn’t expecting to find anyone in the room who could make him have to use it. Steve squares up for the fight he knows is coming. He no longer has his shield, lost in the fight with Thanos, so all he has left to defend himself from the blows that may come to him is his body.

Before Bucky threatens to attack, a strong explosion shakes the ground beneath their feet. After the first impact, Steve can hear two more. The ceiling of the lab begins to collapse creating a big cloud of dust, but Steve manages to hide under a table before anything hits him, and he waits there for the attack to be over.

When Steve finally gets up, he crawls over the rubble looking for his friend’s body. In the exact spot where he was standing before the explosion there is now a huge pile of debris that Steve starts moving aside with his bare hands until he finally gets to see Bucky's face. A beam traps the lower part of his body, which lies inert on the ground.

Steve gently removes the Soldier’s glasses and mask and he holds his face in his hands while he repeats over and over again.

“Bucky, wake up. Look at me. Don’t leave me.”

A few seconds later, the Soldier lifts his chin and his blue, frightened eyes look directly into Steve’s. For a brief moment, something like recognition clouds his gaze but it quickly fades away when Bucky’s head falls back again. His breathing is getting slower every second and Steve fears for his life. He has to move fast and get them out of there as soon as possible.

Making a great effort, he finally manages to move away all the obstacles trapping Bucky’s body. Careful not to cause him any more harm, he takes him in his arms and walks through the corridors of the building avoiding demolished walls until they are finally in the open-air courtyard.

There are a few military vehicles parked outside unattended and Steve decides to borrow one of them. He carefully places Bucky in the back seat and sits behind the wheel. At that moment, a phrase that Natasha had said to him a long time ago comes to his mind: "where did Captain America learn to steal a car?". A twinge of pain pierces him as he remembers his friend, but he doesn’t have time to spare and he can’t afford distracting himself by being sad.

Once he has the car running, he starts thinking about where he can go now. He can’t take Bucky to a hospital, that would arise many questions he can’t answer. So, he chooses the best option he can think of at the moment.

It’s after midnight when Steve parks in front of the house. He gets Bucky out of the car and he starts walking slowly towards the entrance with his friend’s body in his arms. Once there, he has to put him down holding him by the shoulders so he can knock on the door.

After a few minutes with no response, someone switches on the porch light and a familiar face appears at the other side of the door.

“Howard, thank God”, Steve says, relieved. “I need your help”.


End file.
